BUFFALO, N.Y. — For much of the 26 years Norma Gold worked at the Olean Tile Employees Federal Credit Union, she was the only employee in the small suite located inside the now-closed Dal-Tile plant.
While she was paid $13 an hour to keep accurate records, federal prosecutors say Gold instead made false entries in the credit union’s general ledger and altered financial statements to embezzle funds.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office announced Thursday that Gold, 57, of Eldred, Pa., has pleaded guilty to making false entries in federal credit union reports, a charge that carries a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison and a fine of $1 million. According to the plea, Gold embezzled $179,939 from December 2007 to the time of the South Clark Street tile plant and credit union’s closing in December 2012.
“Certainly she was the person in charge of keeping the records and in this case she altered records in order to conceal her embezzlement,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Marie Grisanti, who handled the case, told the Olean Times Herald Thursday.
The credit union primarily serviced Dal-Tile plant employees. Due to the credit union’s small size it relied upon larger banks and financial institutions within the Federal Reserve to hold the deposits and negotiate and pay the personal checks and money orders of its depositors. Those outside institutions held the vast majority of the credit union’s funds.
Gold, who was the office manager for the last 20 years of her career at the credit union, allegedly made it appear that account balances were larger than they actually were. Prosecutors said in order to conceal her theft, Gold altered the true balances of the credit union accounts maintained by outside institutions.
The National Credit Union Administration, a federal agency that regulates all federally chartered credit unions, seized and liquidated the credit union’s funds just days after the tile plant closed. The agency stated in a press release that it determined the credit union was “insolvent and had no prospect for restoring viable operations.”
According to the September 2016 criminal complaint against Gold, an NCUA examination of the credit union that same month showed large discrepancies between the records of the credit union and the records of the institutions that held its deposits. They also found evidence in the office that someone physically cut and pasted numbers onto the account balance sheet of an outside bank that held credit union funds.
Being the only employee, Gold was quickly suspended and the FBI opened an investigation, the complaint stated.
Prosecutors said Gold’s conduct caused substantial hardship to the credit union.
“The discovery of the loss ended up in the credit union shutting down,” Grisanti said. “The National Credit Union Administration closed the bank when they learned about the missing money.”
In a voluntary interview with federal agents on Dec. 17, 2012, at her Eldred home, Gold admitted that she stole about $150,000, and perhaps as much as $200,000, over the previous 15 years, the complaint stated.
“Bank records only go back so far,” Grisanti said. “(From 2007 to 2012 is) the amount we could prove.”
The plea is the result of an investigation by the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent-in-Charge Adam S. Cohen; the NCUA; the U.S. Secret Service, under the direction of Special Agent-in-Charge Lewis Robinson; and the Olean Police Department.
Gold is scheduled to be sentenced at 12:30 p.m. Dec. 21 before U.S. District Judge Richard J. Arcara.
